Moyinoluwa Olajide and Idowu Abdullahi
A 52-year-old woman, Mrs Temitope Familusi, has revealed that she almost killed herself after her first In Vitro Fertilisation failed.
IVF is one of the available assisted reproductive technologies utilised to help persons with fertility problems have a baby.
During IVF, “an egg is removed from the woman’s ovaries and fertilised with sperm in a laboratory. The fertilised egg, called an embryo, is then returned to the woman’s womb to grow and develop”, according to the National Health Service of the United Kingdom.
According to the World Fertility Services, Nigeria has a high success rate of IVF treatment..
The woman, who welcomed triplets with her husband in 2024 after 24 years of marriage, said she hid her pain from those mocking her while she cried her eyes out behind closed doors.
“It was a long journey that made me cry. When people abused me, I don’t cry in front of them. I will go to the back and cry because I don’t want them to know I am in pain,” she said in an interview with PUNCH.
While recounting her ordeals, Temitope, who is a teacher, explained that she married her husband, Gabriel Familusi, on August 26, 2000, adding that they had three failed IVF attempts before their triplets.
She said, “We married on August 26, 2000 and since then, we have been looking for the fruit of the womb. We tried a lot, nothing happened. We did IVF and three failed. The first one I did, I felt like killing myself because I tried drinking snipper, it was one of my neighbors that saved me that day. It was a long journey that made me cry. When people abuse me, I don’t cry in front of them. I will go to the back and cry because I don’t want them to know I am in pain.
“There was a time one of my sisters gave me one of her grandsons to stay with me and when she came to pick up the baby, I cried because when he left, there’s no one to call me mummy again.”
She said despite her age, she was strong and agile during the pregnancy phase and never faced any difficulty.
“I gave birth to my children in July 2024, since then, I have been happy. When I look at them, I always feel happy because I know that I am not alone. Carrying the pregnancy to term wasn’t stressful, even at the hospital I used – General Hospital, Ikorodu – some people will look at me and be like look at this old woman carrying a pregnancy and still looking fine. So, I can say God gave me more strength during that time. I thank God today that I have them and I have proven to mockers that I am not barren,” Temitope said.
Also speaking, Gabriel explained that it was soothing to experience answered prayers, adding that it was hope in God that kept them going when they had no kids.
“We have been to different kinds of hospitals where we did various tests and nothing happened. But we believed in God, prayed and had that hope that one day, we’d have a child.
“The last IVF which was last year, the doctor told us she was pregnant and when they did the scan, they discovered that it was two babies. When she went for the second scan, they now discovered that they were three and we were happy that what we have been praying for has been answered by God. Now, I am happy and feel on top of the world,” Gabriel said.
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